Everybody Hurts
by madame.alexandra
Summary: Post "Bride". Lois walks away from Clark, leaving him outside of the hospital room where Lana is being treated...she doesn't walk far, and he doesn't take long to follow. R/R.


**_A/N: _**This is my first Smallville fic, though I've been a fan of the show for years now. I'm die hard Clois now, though I was Chlark up until her entrance into the show. "Bride" nearly killed me, the minute Lana walked back in, seeing as I that (expletive) and was immensely annoyed to see a Clois kiss prevented. It also broke my heart to see Lois walk away from Clark at the end of the episode, when there seemed to be so much feeling there. So this is set post "Bride", meaning about 5 seconds post "Bride".

Enjoy.

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__I promise. We're going to get Chloe back._

And if we don't get her back, Clark?

Everything is so mechanical and slow. It's like walking through a desert when you've been without water for three days, or trudging through four feet of icy cold snow. Both equally uncomfortable, yet neither as painful as this walk away. Because it's a walk away from him and a walk towards Jimmy, Jimmy whose face is white as paper and whose breathing can barely be called _breathing_. And he's alone, he doesn't know that Chloe's gone, that she's alone, that on their wedding day the fantasy world they'd careful constructed over weeks was demolished—and still I can think of nothing but the crushing, winded feeling that had almost knocked me off my feet when she waltzed back into Clark's barn.

It's not normal to distract yourself from heartache by thinking of the critical condition of your cousin's husband, and her own terrifying disappearance. But that's what I was doing. I was focusing strenuously on them because I couldn't think of him, because the thought of the look in his eye when he turned to find her in the barn doorway was like a pin being twisted deeper into a wound already made.

I'm not a girl who falls easy, or who even breaks down. How much easier is it to be brittle and sarcastic, than to show your feelings on your sleeve? Infinitely. But when you feel the good alone, you suffer the pain alone, and how could I expect him to help me when I wouldn't let him see past the carefully constructed army brat casing around my entire being. He was just too damn sweet to _force_ a girl to cry, and I wasn't going to do it voluntarily—at least not until I was alone in some locked room, with the lights off.

There was that moment, the sudden warmth and complete safety of his comforting hug, just outside the room where they stitched up _her_ leg, the one his eyes _really_ lit up for. Was I imagining him almost kissing me as we danced? Yes. No? It didn't matter. He smelled so good; he was so strong, so warm as he wrapped his arms around me, swearing Chloe was going to be okay. How can you not believe him? He's so sure, so determined…so mystifyingly untouched by doubt and skepticism. How can you not…fall in love…with a man like that? Who was out to save the world? When you're raised around men who fight to save a country, you tend to go for the hero complex.

Walking away from him, after pulling out of that hug that seemed like it could numb the muscles and take all the pain away, was hurting with every step, because there was no warmth anywhere else. There was only ice to face, and only fear in the future. Because no matter what the turn out, someone was going to hurt, I could feel it. There was this pricking feeling that it was going to me.

The walking stopped. I looked around blankly, watching doctors, nurses, and people run around in blurs, touching Jimmy's deathly cold hand on the gurney they had him on. It was stopped, nearby, and a shouting doctor pulled him into a room, doing some fast work. Medivac. I was going with him to Star City, and something was wrong. A doctor pushed me, shoved me out of the way, a nurse shouted something to another. I backed up, watching the scene, desperately hoping he was all right, that if we found Chloe it wouldn't be only to tell her that Jimmy was dead, that he hadn't made it…

"It'll have to wait, an hour at least!"

A sharp shout that I heard clearly. The doctors were running madly in Jimmy's room. The bleeding, the bleeding must have started again. I turned away from the open door of the room they'd thrust him in and looked around, the mob of people inconveniencing me. I could feel every sinew in my body tear, my mind start to snap, and there was no way I was losing it here. I walked steadily but quickly down a white-washed, chloric-smelling hallway, and jiggled a door, opening it to reveal a crisp and clean, and very small hospital room. Probably where they put people to die. Barely having time to shut the door, I stumbled over to the bed and, leaning down with one hand to support myself on the white sheets, covered my mouth to stifles sobs, my eyes burning furiously as held back tears poured over my face.

Why Chloe, why Chloe, why _Chloe_? Why Jimmy, why any of them? And why on _this_ day? _I _was supposed to be unhappy, not them. They were supposed to be together, so blissfully happy, and here we were in the midst of destruction—and I'm in so much shock I can't throw away the feeling of disgust at myself, of longing and want, and I'm overwhelmed by pain and sadness, yet I'm the only one without a scratch on me. I guarantee I'm the one hurting the most.

I don't know how long I was in that room alone, but suddenly I knew I wasn't anymore. It was a choking sensation that made me stop crying, the instant reaction of anger that someone had caught me in a weak moment, and immediately I turned to lash out, having no good grip on any emotion right now. The door was clicking shut as I turned to attack, and I pulled my hand away from my mouth, trying to speak…when I saw him, all that came out was another hiccupping sob, and I stumbled forward on my heels.

He caught me by the elbow, his gentle face mapped with concern and sadness, his strong hand wrapping around my shoulder and steadying me on my feet. I heard him say my name softly, ask me if something else had happened. I was so angry at him in the next moment, I lifted my head to find his face and he was a blur of angry tears. His eyes were still blue through the smear of water, and I wondered how I looked to him, what he thought of this utter mess he'd found hidden in the back of some hospital, too afraid to face the doctors with bad news. He said something else and I shook my head as a reflex, having no idea what he'd said…he released my elbow and he wrapped an arm around my waist, his other behind my neck and over my shoulders, bending my frame into him, so we fit together.

I closed my eyes tightly, pressing lips together to try and prevent the flood of emotion demanding to escape. My shoulders shook from the force of holding everything back, and I felt his soft fingertips against my scalp, drawing his hands through my hair. My hand tightened on his bicep and I twisted the other into a handful of his shirt, pressing my forehead against his chest, hiding my shameful face.

There was utter silence all around me, and it was just him, a rock in the jelly world that had seemed to develop around us since the disaster at the farm. It was like he was holding me up, and for once it was good just to let someone be there for _me_. Maybe it was because I still had a little too much champagne in my system. He was shushing softly in my ear, warm breath moving strands of my falling apart hair, and I reveled in it, ashamed again that this was what I craved and wanted in the midst of my cousins' tragedy.

"Why did you come looking for me?" I asked, trying to summon the anger. It was there, but weakly, and it was subdued more by the muffled sound I made as I spoke against him. He didn't answer for a moment, tilting my head back and putting a hand on my cheek, brushing strands of tear-wet hair out of the way.

"Why did you walk away if you needed me?" he asked, innocently, his eyebrows furrowed.

Farmboy, you are more perceptive than I'd ever imagined. How dare you pull that secret from the depths of my soul, how dare you bring up the guilty, selfish thing I need when I should be out there holding Jimmy's hand, or doing everything I can to find Chloe before something _irreversible_ happens.

I looked at him, my lips parted slightly in a little of discomfort and a little of surprise, and I flattened my hand against his chest, releasing grip on his shirt, watching the wrinkles.

"What are you talking about, Smallville?" I asked warily, my voice a gasping croak. I eyed him suspiciously, curious as to what he was really thinking about. Why he wasn't with his precious darling, why he was standing here so tightly wrapped around me?

Clark tightened the grip around my waist; he brushed his thumb over my cheek, clearing away tears, and the motion served to annoy me further that he was with me while I was in this unpresentable, despicable state. He looked so determined, and something equally angry was in his eyes, but he was subdued and sorry and innocent all at the same time. He truly wanted to save the world. You could see it in his stupid, gorgeous, Farmboy eyes.

"You didn't fool that lie detector. You didn't fool me. And I don't care if you _cry_ when you need to _cry_."

I wasn't exactly sure if he answered my question, or if what he said made sense, but there was the longest and at the same time the shortest moment of eye-gazing in the history of dramatic eye-gazes before he lifted my head back up and pressed his lips against mine.

It was like drinking hot chocolate after a freezing cold ice skate, or like waking up with a clear nose after days of suffering through sinuses. I didn't see stars, I saw colors, and I didn't feel butterflies but instead warmth and relief. I could breathe again, even though his lips were velvet and smothering, and he was devouring me. Who knew Smallville could _kiss_ like this…

It was the perfect medication, the pain-killer, and the anti-depressant. My brand of heroin and my ringing wake-up call, the fix to my selfishness and my guilt. Touching his hair, his smooth and warm skin, feeling his protective, strong arms around me, I could feel all my confusion and self-shame melt away into pure worry and fear for my cousin and her husband, and kissing him, feeling the world rock beneath my stabilized feet, I could believe in the words he whispered in my ear again, his lips now brushing my neck.

_I promise…we're going to get Chloe back._

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**A/N: **This is a one-shot, but as it's my frist Smallville and Clois fic, please do give feedback. It's meant to be written in a James Joyce sort of way of uncconected conscious, if that rings bells for anybody. Do we like, or non?


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